Laura Strickler – NBC News Sept 21, 2023
Two U.S. Marine F-35B Lightning II Joint Strike Fighters complete vertical landings aboard the USS Wasp (LHD-1) during operational testing May 18, 2015. Click to enlarge
Days after a $100 million F-35B crashed in rural South Carolina, a government watchdog report released Thursday highlights ongoing maintenance delays showing F-35 fighter jets are “mission capable” only 55% of the time.
“If the aircraft can only perform 55% of the time and the goal is 85 to 90% of the time, taxpayers are not getting their money’s worth,” said Diana Maurer, who authored the report for the Government Accountability Office.
The F-35 program, led by military contractor Lockheed Martin, is one of the Defense Department’s most expensive, costing taxpayers a total of $1.7 trillion over its lifespan.
Much of the program’s expense — $1.3 trillion — is the cost of maintaining and operating the fighter jets, the GAO report said.
Maurer said the fighter jet’s overall sustainment “rests entirely on Lockheed Martin and the sub-contractors it hires.” While that is not unique to the F-35, the GAO found that the contractor-led approach can cause delays.
For example, the report says the GAO spoke to military maintenance staff members at three locations who said they were not allowed to look up spare part numbers for the F-35 because the proprietary database was controlled by Lockheed, the prime contractor. “Not having ready access to part numbers hinders the repair of the aircraft because it delays the ordering and receipt of needed parts,” the report said.
Maintenance on components for the F-35 fighter jets is behind, leaving more than 10,000 components in the queue waiting to be repaired, the report said.
The F-35 is used by the Air Force, the Marines and the Navy. Previous maintenance concerns have led to a push for the Pentagon to take over management of F-35 maintenance, but the shift is not scheduled to occur until late 2027, the report said.
Congress mandated the GAO review as part of last year’s defense bill after ongoing maintenance challenges were identified.
The GAO made seven recommendations to address maintenance delays, and the Pentagon concurred with all of them, the report said.
In a statement, Lockheed Martin said, “We stand ready to partner with the government as plans are created for the future of F-35 sustainment ensuring mission readiness and enabling deterrence.”
Har!
“We stand ready to partner with the government”
One set of incompetents partner with another? Priceless!
Lucky for the world, the US is going broke one weapons system at a time.
The Nazi jokes just keep coming. So there’s a parts problem, but it’s much, much worse.
These flying bathtubs need to be services every two sorties. The Russian equivalent can fly 5/6 sorties compared to the F35s 2 sorties. In a combat theater, could they ditch the servicing, assuming there were still places or carriers afloat to service them?
HMS Queen Elizabeth (rust bucket) is due to sail to the relatively safe US East Coast, but will only have 8 F35Bs on board. Normal compliment is 24, with a max of 36. When HMS Prince of Wales passes it’s shaft greasing tests, it is expected to also head for safer waters. How many F35s will she carry?
If funny and strange that Nazi states like the UK can buy F35 junkers, but can’t buy the F22, which no one can buy, but Israel might have been given a few. The truth, the F22 is probably worse than the F35.
So bad is the F35, that bankrupt Britain plans to build it’s own 6th generation fighter, with Japanese help.
“Days after a $100 million F-35B crashed in rural South Carolina, a government watchdog report released Thursday highlights ongoing maintenance delays showing F-35 fighter jets are “mission capable” only 55% of the time.”
News flash: Anything the US does whether be it politically, socially, economically, you name it falls well below 55% of complete accomplishment. This country has been half ass for decades.
Increasing EMP,s, power surges, smoke in cockpits, the F35 is just too vulnerable most of the time it’s in the air, it’s the same with most passenger planes now. I never fly again.
The F-35 has been an insanely overpriced shit-bucket from the start. Everyone knew it. Then there’s the fact that several terabytes of data and designs on that lumbering dumpster, every detail of it, were stolen years ago, long before it was close to operational, and put up for sale on the open market, meaning it was utterly vulnerable, hackable, and suddenly worth less than a flying bucket of pig piss. All of that meant they should have ditched that dead-on-arrival corpse before it went into production, yet the cartel stealing the people’s money still threw a criminally insane amount of dough to the military industrial complex for that steaming wad of shit. The joke is on us, again.
Well, you helped them destroy Germany and Japan.